The conversation, and how to have it

Sit down with the chapter "The six roads" and read it together. Then ask three questions and listen to the answers rather than correcting them.

"Which of these six sentences sounds most like you?" Use the sentences in "What suits me". Let your child pick. If they pick something you did not expect, ask why before you respond.

"What do you actually enjoy doing when nobody is making you do it?" The answer is information, even when it does not sound like a career. Each pathway says who it suits.

"What do you think I want you to choose?" This one is uncomfortable and it is the most useful question in the list. Children optimise for their parents' approval, often silently, and often at the cost of a choice that would have fitted them better. If the answer is "engineering, because you want that", you have learned something important before it became a five-year mistake.